A Few Thoughts about the Bucs Game - Community Edition

[Pete]

Samuel ran selfless clear outs all game, and opened everything up.

 

Dorian Williams was tremendous fluctuating between spying Baker, and then selflessly setting picks violently, allowing other players to the ball.

 

Shavers won deep consistently.  He made some key blocks.  Then played coverage teams.  One cannot praise Shavers enough for his game.  
 

Secondary played very well, providing sticky coverage. 

[BearNorth]

49 minutes ago, Livinginthepast said:

This is the bizarre thing about McD, he takes over the defensive playcalling when things get bad for his DCs, sometimes it works and sometimes its its takes a while but eventually works then other times its embarrassing. This seems to happen with regularity so what is the point of Babich exactly? If he is so incapable that helicopter dad McD has to take over for him then why is he the DC?. Maybe we should get a seasoned proven DC in here and revamp this defense? Someone better than Babich and McD?

 

 

I doubt Schwartz would come if McDermott was the head coach tho.  Like Wade, if you hire Schwartz as the DC, stay out of my room.

 

[Big Turk]

18 hours ago, billsfan714 said:

Thank god for the Bengals or we would have the worst rushing defense in the league.  It was the same old, same old except we made Sean Tucker look like Gibbs.  It wasnt a good runningback this time.  It was a guy who probably isnt rostered in 14 team fantasy leagues.  Look at the teams in the bottom 8 in rush defense, none of them will go to the superbowl, including us.  As happy as I was seeing an improved passing attack, it was more than disappointing watching that rush defense, again.  Its atrocious, plain and simple.

 

Dude has speed tho...runs a 4.33

[GunnerBill]

36 minutes ago, Livinginthepast said:

This is the bizarre thing about McD, he takes over the defensive playcalling when things get bad for his DCs, sometimes it works and sometimes its its takes a while but eventually works then other times its embarrassing. This seems to happen with regularity so what is the point of Babich exactly? If he is so incapable that helicopter dad McD has to take over for him then why is he the DC?. Maybe we should get a seasoned proven DC in here and revamp this defense? Someone better than Babich and McD?

 

I think McD taking over the playcalling HAS worked. When I was advocating for him to do it, even before the Falcons game where it became obvious he had to it, the two things I said I thought it would fix were third down and the confusion pre-snap. 

 

While Tampa had a good day on 3rd down on Sunday overall the 3rd down D since McD took over is singificantly improved (was about 20% points better before Sunday). And the pre-snap miscommunications have been better the past game or two after being an issue all season (including the first couple of McDemott games). 

 

He isn't going to magically fix the rest of it. I think the talent on D gives it a pretty clear ceiling. Someone said it elswhere they are kind of between two stools.... older guys who are dropping off and young rookie / 2nd year guys who haven't established themselves yet. The prime age/experience guys on this D are basically the three they resigned this year - Groot, Bernard and Benford - and Oliver who is done for the year. I was pretty clear at the time I wasn't necessarily in favour of extending Bernard. And I was on the fence with Groot.

 

The positives on defense from this year are Walker, Bishop and Hairston. Three talented young guys who have really shown some promise. 

[KHAN]

The defense will not be able to shut down good teams this year. Just not enough healthy talent.

 

I can understand the concept of taking the air out of the ball on offense. But that's what you do with a game manager QB. We have Josh, and the goal moving forward needs to be to let Josh go balls to the wall and try to score as many points as possible. The goal needs to be put up 50. Try to limit his  running plays to important downs. 

 

[HappyDays]

3 hours ago, GunnerBill said:

The problem isn't the read. Or Knox. Josh is just late on the throw. I think a lot of his issues in recent weeks - including the poorer throws in this game - have been due to timing. If that is thrown half a second sooner it is a completion. 

 

I could be wrong but I believe he wants #8 and #21 to cross before he throws the sit route. The timing gets messed up primarily because Palmer gets chucked to the ground which causes #21 to slow down right in the throwing window to Knox.

 

This is the moment where he ideally wants to be releasing the ball:

 

 

Like I said I could be wrong but I believe #21's positioning is why he has to throw it a half second late.

[GunnerBill]

58 minutes ago, Nihilarian said:

PlayerPosPractice StatusStatusDetails

 

Tyler Bass K Injured Reserve

DeWayne Carter DT Injured Reserve

Tylan Grable OL Injured Reserve

Damar Hamlin DBI njured Reserve

Michael Hoecht DT Injured Reserve

Landon Jackson DE Injured Reserve

Cameron Johnston P Injured Reserve

Ed Oliver DL Injured Reserve

Wande Owens S Injured Reserve

Taylor Rapp S Injured Reserve

T.J. Sanders DT Injured Reserve

Dorian Strong CB Injured Reserve

Dalton Kincaid TE DNPOutHamstring

Phidarian Mathis DT

 

Taron Johnson CB LimitedQuestionableGroin

Cameron Lewis DB LimitedQuestionableCalf

T.J. Sanders DT FullQuestionableKnee

Shaq Thompson OLB Questionable

 

Buffalo has limited cap space and once everyone is back healthy they will be improved on defense

 

The problem is a lot of those guys are not coming back this year. 

 

Hoecht is done. Jackson is done. Strong is done (and who knows career wise). Rapp is done (maybe a good thing). Oliver at best is back for the playoffs. 

2 minutes ago, HappyDays said:

 

I could be wrong but I believe he wants #8 and #21 to cross before he throws the sit route. The timing gets messed up primarily because Palmer gets chucked to the ground which causes #21 to slow down right in the throwing window to Knox.

 

This is the moment where he ideally wants to be releasing the ball:

 

 

Like I said I could be wrong but I believe #21's positioning is why he has to throw it a half second late.

 

I still think it can go half a second sooner. He has not been decisive enough in multiple games. When he overthinks he makes mistakes. When Josh is playing instinctive and decisive it doesn't matter whether he is going short or long he is hard to stop. 

[Ralonzo]

19 hours ago, Big Turk said:

I know this is crazy saying it after the Bills scored 44 points but I felt like they left a lot of easy plays out there and could have easily put up 60 on the Bucs.  

 

It's pretty hard to put up 60 when the main goal of your offense is to shorten the game to 7-8 possessions... the only calculation I can think of for this strategy is when you think your defense is worse than the opponent by an even larger margin than your offense is better than them.